Cake with Katie No. 02: Jo Piazza
Bite-sized Q&As with my favorite authors
Welcome back to Cake with Katie! This month, we’re talking with Jo Piazza. I absolutely adored her novel The Sicilian Inheritance last year, and her next book, Everyone Is Lying to You, releases Tuesday! More on both (and more!) below.
Last summer, I got swept away in The Sicilian Inheritance (review here), a fabulous book that blends historical fiction and mystery across two timelines—2016 and 1906. In the present day, we follow Sara Marsala, a woman living in Philadelphia whose beloved aunt has passed away. Her aunt’s dying wish is for Sara to travel to Sicily to spread her ashes and learn what happened to Sara’s great-grandmother, Serafina. Serafina is our narrator through the 1900s, telling her story in a vivid portrayal of life as a woman in Sicily at a time when men were fleeing in search of better opportunities abroad. I found the whole thing totally fascinating—perhaps in part because of my Maltese heritage (Malta is an island country just 50 miles south of Sicily)—but I mostly attribute it to Jo’s captivating writing style and her ability to make both stories, past and present, so compelling. I cannot believe how much I learned! This would make an excellent bookclub book, as the subject matter offers much to discuss, and the food and drink pairings are ripe for the picking!
I wasn’t aware of this while I was reading TSI , but the book was actually based on the real-life murder of Jo’s great-great-grandmother in Sicily in 1916. Her novel is fictional, but after completing it, Jo launched The Sicilian Inheritance podcast (find it here), where she uses her journalism background to investigate the true story behind it. How freaking cool is that?!
Now, I am eagerly awaiting Jo’s next release, Everyone Is Lying to You—out on July 15th! This story is about two college best friends, Bex and Lizzie, whose friendship abruptly ended after graduation. Fifteen years later, Bex—now Rebecca Sommers—is a famous “trad wife” influencer, and Lizzie is a struggling magazine writer. Bex contacts Lizzie out of the blue with a career-making offer: join her at a high-profile influencer conference, and get an exclusive interview with Bex herself. But once there, Bex goes missing—and her husband is found murdered. I am so excited to read this, and if you are too, you can pre-order it here!
Now, without further ado, my interview with Jo Piazza!
Katie: As always, dessert first! What’s your favorite cake of all time? Or, if you’re not a dessert person, what would be one of your character’s favorite cakes? Or both!
Jo: This is really hard because I am a massive cake person. And this question reminds me of when we stayed in a hotel in Scopello [a village in Sicily] while doing research for The Sicilian Inheritance, and the breakfast buffet had 19 kinds of cake. This is not at all an exaggeration. And friend, I tried all those cakes, and my only regret is not having more. Tiramisu is actually my favorite cake, but a molten chocolate is very close behind.
Katie: What is your “&”—your bubbly to your beach reads—your must-have indulgence, comfort, or ritual to go along with your writing process?
Jo: I wish that I could cocktail and write, but alas, I have to write first thing in the morning while my brain is fresh, or I am not getting it out. So, I usually have two coffees first thing while I write. Editing is a whole different ballgame, and if I’m doing it in the late afternoon, I pour myself a good Negroni.
Katie: Tell us about Everyone Is Lying to You. What can we expect when we pick it up this summer?
Jo: Everyone Is Lying to You is an addictive murder mystery set in the high-stakes world of tradwife influencing, where everyone has something to hide. At its heart, it’s about two women: Rebecca, a wildly popular “momfluencer” whose picture-perfect online life is hiding some very dark secrets, and Lizzie, a journalist whose own career is on the rocks because traditional journalism is very much dying. When tragedy strikes Rebecca’s seemingly idyllic family, Lizzie is assigned to cover the story and quickly realizes that nothing about Rebecca’s life adds up. It’s a story about truth, lies, and the dangerous power of the stories we tell ourselves and the world.
The idea came from my own fascination with the influencer world. As a journalist and podcaster, I’ve spent years watching this space evolve, and I’ve always been struck by the gap between what we see online and what’s really happening behind the scenes. I wanted to explore what happens when that gap becomes a chasm, when the lies we tell online start to unravel in real life. And, honestly, I just love a good, juicy murder mystery!
Katie: What was your favorite part of writing The Sicilian Inheritance?
Jo: I don’t think I can name just one thing. I loved getting the chance to dive headfirst into the history of women in Sicily, including my own great-great-grandmother Lorenza Marsala. I loved each and every one of the characters so much—they continue to live rent-free in my head (especially Giusy).
The whole writing process was so much fun, but in the last two weeks, I traveled to Sicily to finish the book off and start the podcast. I ate every single dish I mentioned in the book (for fact-checking), and I went into the kitchens, interviewed the chefs, and learned how to make each one. That may have been my favorite part.
Katie: I just discovered The Sicilian Inheritance podcast and can’t believe it took me this long to find it! For readers like me who weren’t in the know, can you tell us a little bit about it?
Jo: Absolutely. So, The Sicilian Inheritance is based on the real-life murder of my great-great-grandmother Lorenza Marsala in Sicily in 1916. I did some initial research, but then I stopped looking into the real story while I was writing the novel because I wanted the license to create fiction. I put the real story aside until after I turned the book in, but because I am a very thorough content creator and insatiably curious, I then decided that I had to solve her unsolved murder in real life. I took my three kids under the age of six to Sicily for a month and launched an investigation that became the true-crime podcast, The Sicilian Inheritance.
Katie: How was writing EILTY different than writing TSI? What surprised you the most while writing EILTY?
Jo: The Sicilian Inheritance was a long process. I started about a decade ago, put her in a drawer, and returned to her in earnest during the pandemic. It’s a book that had to marinate. Everyone Is Lying to You flew out of me in three months last summer. I’ve been immersed in reporting on influencer culture for five years for my podcast Under the Influence, and tradwives kept surfacing for me. I’ve interviewed dozens of current and former traditional influencers, and I couldn’t stop thinking about the reality of their stories versus the fantasies they project on social media. That level of deception felt incredibly ripe for a delicious thriller.
Katie: If we’re hosting bookclub for EILTY, what drink do we have to serve?
Jo: Definitely a ranch water! But also maybe a tequila sunrise because it matches the dusty red sands of the fields out west.
Katie: What’s your favorite book you’ve read this year (can be an ARC that’s not even out yet!)?
Jo: I loved Wild Dark Shore and recommended it to a ton of my friends. I also bought it for a lot of people. Buying books and randomly gifting them is my love language.
Katie: What would you recommend to someone in a reading rut who wants to get back into it?
Jo: If you’re in a rut, you want to read something that is going to make you feel all the feelings in the best possible way. I want someone to finish the book, put it down, and think, “Man, that was fun. I want to do it again.” I think The Wedding People really delivered on that note. So did Sipsworth. When I’m in a rut, I always ask my favorite booksellers what to read to get out of it because they always know best.
Katie: It’s hard to put you in a single genre box—where do you get your inspiration, and how do you decide what to write next?
Jo: This is true. But I do think if there was a section of the bookstore entitled ‘Stories About Badass Women Defying the Odds,’ all of my books would fit there. But alas, I haven’t seen one yet. We are working on building a mobile bookstore right now, and I absolutely plan to have sections exactly like this.
I read across a lot of different genres, and I think a lot of readers enjoy doing that too. My biggest goal is to write compelling stories with engaging characters that are hard to forget. And I think you can do that in all of the genres. It’s also fun to play around with them. The Sicilian Inheritance was historical fiction and also a family murder mystery. Everyone Is Lying to You is more straight-up thriller. I do have an idea for a romance brewing too (Katie: !!!), but I haven’t even told my editor that one.
Katie C: The Sicilian Inheritance was incredibly well researched. Can you tell us about your research process?
Jo: I’ve been a journalist for 25 years, so the research and the reporting for a book come really naturally to me. I always approach my fiction the same way I would nonfiction. I dig into primary sources, and I do interviews with people who are experts in what I am writing about. I also interview people in similar fields. So, for The Sicilian Inheritance, I interviewed female butchers, and I even took a butchering course. I can come over and quarter a hog at your next barbecue if you want me to. I also talked to some of the oldest folks I could find in Sicily to hear some of their stories about the generation above them. And then I spoke to academics who studied women and history on the island.
Lauren: TSI and your great-great-grandmother’s story are both intriguing. When writing the book, how did you balance honoring her story with telling a story that would sell and resonate with so many readers?
Jo: It ended up being easier than I thought it would be to separate the two because I realized early on what story I wanted to tell in the novel and what I wanted the ending to be. I knew I couldn’t manipulate Lorenza’s story to be that, so I put it aside. But, obviously, it stayed with me because I went back to solve the murder!
Meet Jo in person at one of her upcoming book tour stops! You can listen to The Sicilian Inheritance podcast here and her other popular podcast Under the Influence here. Find Jo on Substack and Instagram!
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xoxo, Katie
Editor:
Cheers to Jo and badass women defying the odds!
I love Cake with Katie! I cannot wait to read EILTY. Sicilian Inheritance was so good, I love hearing about the background behind it. And the cake for breakfast reminds me of Problematic Summer Romance and the gelato for breakfast. Italians do meals in the best way! 😍